Contract time may not be a happy experience for Karmichael Hunt

The contract situation for Karmichael Hunt sums up the problems facing rugby union.

Karmichael Hunt has been a steadying influence for the Waratahs this season but he does not have a contract for next year. Picture: Getty Images

It’s curious how history continually funnels sweeping, complicated events down into a single person. All the easier for us poor limited humans to get our heads around, I assume. And in the NSW and former Wallaby Karmichael Hunt we have just such a figure for these convoluted times in rugby.

Hunt hasn’t been brilliant for the Waratahs but he has been very good. Solid, commanding, and in a backline overrun with escapees from the local child care centre, he is the experienced player holding it all together. There was a genuine feeling of unease around the NSW camp last week when he was ruled out with a strained hamstring the day before the Brumbies match. And so it proved on game day where his steadying influence was missing.

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Contract time has rolled around again and, unhappily for Hunt, his expires at the end of a season that has been ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic. Had he put pen to paper last year, he would have arrived at a figure with lots of zeros — at the end of the number, not the beginning — and all would have been pretty with the world. Whether that contract, or others struck around the same time, hold up in the coming months remains to be seen. Still, a bird in the hand, and all that. Now Hunt faces an uncertain future. In that respect, he is no different to many players who fit the “middle management” description but there is something about him — maybe it’s the Japanese-style topknot — that captures the eye.

For some time now, rugby authorities have been musing aloud on how the post-COVID contracting system would play out. The consensus was that the elite players would be looked after first, then the promising up-and-comers and only then everyone in between. When it was all said in an abstract fashion, it made reasonable sense, a kind of rugby triage. But now we are reaching the point where that system will have to be put into effect and it is suddenly hitting home to us who will be affected.

First thing to note is Hunt’s age. 33. Goodness knows from my vantage point, he is barely a babe-in-arms, but from a rugby perspective, this will be his last serious contract. He will turn 35 in November of next year and, frankly, the only other 35-year-old in Australian rugby who comes readily to mind is the Western Force’s Richard Kahui. He won a World Cup with the All Blacks in 2011, remember — was in the actual starting side, not on the bench or one of the dozen players who didn’t even get suited up — so let there be no question we are discussing a seriously talented footballer here.

But the worst thing that has happened to him lately was that his grubber kick through for a Brynard Stander try — against the Waratahs, from memory — paid off so brilliantly with a spectacular try in the corner. Ever since he has been trying to replicate it and it is being brought home to him and the Force, why grubbers in the attacking 22 are considered such a low-percentage play. So it did not surprise when coach Tim Sampson dropped him to the bench for the Friday night clash with the Brumbies. His best role is as an impact player, a finisher, as Michael Cheika would have called him.

Presumably that is the future awaiting Hunt. It’s an honourable role and an important one. But not a lavishly well-paid one, even for a footballer who has played six Tests.

Right now, Waratahs coach Rob Penny and Waratahs general manager of rugby Tim Rapp are sorting through their wish lists, their possibilities, their must-haves, and determining who fits into what category. The money? That will hinge on the salary cap which will hinge on the broadcast deal which will hinge on what sort of competition model we end up with in 2021. As Nikki Gemmell wrote in The Weekend Australian’s Magazine last weekend: “Everything is changing so suddenly, our future is so unpredictable. Uncertainty equals stress.”

So these are stressful times. Perhaps not on the scale of 1942 when Australia was threatened with invasion but still there is a sense the entire country is under siege. And in that small part of it in which rugby is regarded as important, Hunt and dozens just like him are trying to do the best by themselves and their families.

All of this, of course, is being played out against the backdrop of the global rugby economy that is itself also showing signs of stress and confusion. There are suggestions that overseas salaries, too, will be slashed but not by as much in Australia. On the other hand, Australians playing abroad are starting to find that their host nation — France, for instance — is becoming increasing nationalistic, which suggests there may be a host of Wallabies-eligible players about to come onto the open market.

Realistically, bringing home the rugby diaspora is the only valid way in which Australia can sustain five teams in a trans-Tasman competition. And it is infinitely preferably to supplementing teams with foreign players who will only clog up our own selection system.

There is no doubt that players such as Tomas Cubelli, the Pumas halfback who previously played with the Brumbies, will be sponsored in part by his home country in coming to Australia, on the basis that Argentina needs him to be playing top-class rugby. So Australia would be unwise to turn up its nose at quality players of his ilk. But that’s not to say that we can’t indulge in a little “Australia-first” ourselves.

It helps, of course, when Michael Hooper does it the other way around and heads off to Japan and the Toyota Verblitz club for the 2021 Top League season. Not only is it likely, as Waratahs halfback Jake Gordon noted on Friday, that he will return an even better player but what it also means is that for the duration of his sabbatical, someone else is paying his wages. It’s a win-win for Australian rugby, not to mention a well-deserved reward for a player who has rendered the Wallabies enormous service.

For the majority of players, however, next month hasn’t been sorted yet, let alone next year. Australia can’t afford to let a player like Hunt slip away. The question is, however, can we afford to keep him? And others just like him?